isaac Mao's Public Library

As we move our entire lives into the digital sphere, we humans like to maintain a bit of the physical space. We crave it. And embrace it. Where all the world’s music is at the touch of our finger (literally), I’m building a physical vinyl record collection that I’m proud of. And will happily share with people when we’re together.

I get it. You’re trying to sell your Pono player. I don’t quite get why anyone would buy it. David Pogue debunked its biggest selling point that it sounds BETTER than a CD. Well most listeners actually thought the iTunes file sounded better in an A/B test. So there’s that. Even Pono’s engineers stated “no significant technical advantage over CD-quality.” And Pono isn’t mobile to the point of fitting in my pocket. It’s a damn triangle. And can albums cost upwards of $25?! Most of the vinyl I buy doesn’t even cost that much! How do you get off charging that?

Music is my passion, my love and my career. And I am happy to use as many of my senses as possible to fully experience it.

“Owning a Picasso doesn’t mean you can sell prints or reproductions, but that you’re the sole owner of a unique original. And that’s what Once Upon a Time in Shaolin is. It’s a unique original rather than a master copy of an album.”

They all agree that the best companies are the ones that started because nothing else like them existed.

The idea for home renovation and design platform Houzz came in 2009 when Tatarko and her cofounder and husband, Alon Cohen, couldn’t find an easy and affordable way to renovate their newly bought 1950s ranch home in Palo Alto.

If Hartz could give one piece of advice to all entrepreneurs, it would be to "really invest in the people." If you can’t hire right away, then get great advisers, but always be seeking people who can help get you from Point A to Point B, she says.

"Go to investors with a real product with traction, instead of a deck," she explains. "If you spend the first six months to a year building a great product or service rather than chasing investors and redoing PowerPoints, you’ll be surprised how the dynamic with investors will change."

The Tyranny of Choice remains one of the biggest challenges for streaming services, namely how to make sense of 35 million songs. It has been challenge enough for the Aficionados at the vanguard of the first wave of subscription service adoption. It is a problem of far greater proportions for the next wave of subscribers, the later adopters who do not have the expertise nor intent to invest great effort into discovering new music. It is not as simple as ‘lean forward’ versus ‘lean back’. But instead gradations between the two. Beyond Apple’s inevitable Spotify-subscriber win back efforts, these early followers will be at the core of Apple’s streaming strategy.

As Eli Pariser identified in his excellent Ted Talk ‘Beware Of Filter Bubbles’ there is a risk that recommendation algorithms actually narrow our choice and limit discovery. That by continually refining recommendations based on previous taste and choice they make our world views increasingly narrow and ultimately boring. Music discovery is not simply about finding music that sounds like other music we already like. It is also about serendipitous moments of wonder when something comes at us from the left field and leaves us breathless. That is the antithesis of ‘here are three other bands like this you might like’.

In 1841, Albius discovered how to quickly pollinate the vanilla orchid with a thin stick or blade of grass and a simple thumb gesture. With the stick or grass blade, field hands lift the rostellum, the flap that separates the male anther from the female stigma, and then, with their thumbs, smear the sticky pollen from the anther over the stigma.

That means that the cost of goods sold (COGS) for the iPhone is about $293. Is that a lot? Where does that money go? What else does it tell us about how the company operates?

Bill of materials (BOM). This represents the cost of the components that go into the device. These are paid to suppliers.

Transportation/warehousing. This is the cost to transport and store the product before sale. This is paid to shipping companies and warehousing.

Manufacturing cost (including labor). This is paid to contract manufacturers.

Warranty expense. This is paid back to customers for returned product that can no longer be sold.

Note that R&D (engineering and development) and Sales, General and Administrative (e.g. Marketing) costs are not part of this cost structure. They are considered fixed costs and are not allocated to individual units of production.

The law is clear that the right to petition one's government for the redress of grievances may be exercised in large groups . . . . These rights may . . . be exercised by marching, even along public highways.[72]